Death Warrant (film)

Death Warrant
Theatrical release poster
Directed by	Deran Sarafian
Written by	David S. Goyer
Produced by	Mark di Salle
Starring	Jean-Claude Van Damme Robert Guillaume Cynthia Gibb George Dickerson Patrick Kilpatrick
Cinematography	Russell Carpenter
Edited by	John A. Barton Cheryl Kroll G. Gregg McLaughlin
Music by	Gary Chang
Production company	MGM-Pathé Communications[1]
Distributed by	Metro-Goldwyn-Mayer[2]
Release date	September 14, 1990 (1990-09-14)
Running time	89 minutes
Country	United States[3]
Language	English
Budget	$6 million[4]
Box office	$46.7 million[5]

Death Warrant is a 1990 American/Canadian prison action thriller film directed by Deran Sarafian, produced by Mark di Salle, and starring Jean-Claude Van Damme. The film was written by David S. Goyer while a student at USC, and was Goyer's first screenplay to be sold and produced commercially. In the film, police detective Louis Burke is going into a prison facility in California as an undercover cop in order to find out who was behind a mysterious series of murders, and finds himself locked up with his nemesis: Christian Naylor, a psychotic serial killer who calls himself "The Sandman," who sets out to exact revenge upon him after getting into prison.

Death Warrant was released on September 14, 1990. Upon its release, the film grossed $46 million against a production budget of only $6 million. The film received general mixed critical reaction from critics who found the direction, its storyline, villain, and the plot poor, but highly praised the acting as well as the action scenes and the thrilling atmosphere.